Update

I'm working full-time and parenting part-time, so my time and energy available for blogging is somewhat reduced these days. Nevertheless, I'm going to try to go back to posting regularly, at least 2 - 3 times a week.

I've been posting at two sites - DiL-1 on Blogger and DiL-2 on TypePad - and this will continue for a little longer, through the end of August. However, I'm making plans to move my blog to a new site, under a new title, at the beginning of September. More details to follow.

There are other changes in the works, too. After six years of living in San Francisco, I'm getting ready to move back to Portland, Oregon at the end of 2013.

Syrian Jihadis Behead Catholic Priest

Jihadists in Syria kidnapped a Catholic priest in the Idlib area and beheaded him as scores of onlookers, including children, cheered and recorded the event on their cell phones. The Vatican reported last week that the priest was captured by fighters "linked" to the Al Nusrah Front for the People in the Levant, al Qaeda's affiliate in Syria.

The Vatican confirmed that Father François Murad was killed on June 23 after jihadists affiliated with the Al Nusrah Front overran his monastery in Gassanieh, a town in the countryside in the northern province of Idlib.

"According to local sources, the monastery where Fr. Murad was staying was attacked by militants linked to the jihadi group Jabhat al Nusrah [the Al Nusrah Front]," said the Fides News Agency, the Vatican's official media outlet. ...

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What I Think

I wasn't there and I didn't see what happened, so I don't know of my own knowledge whether George Zimmerman killed Trayvon Martin in self-defense or in cold blood.

What little I do know about the case, I learned from the news media; and at first I believed Zimmerman was a ruthless, racist killer. But I became less sure of that idea as I learned more about the case, and in particular about how the media had covered the case. They chose not to tell me, for example, that Zimmerman was bleeding from an apparent attack, or that when he said of Martin "he looks black" it was in response to a question about Martin's race.

I started out thinking those guys from the Duke Lacrosse team were guilty, too, until the accuser's story started falling apart.

Here's what I think now. I think there are a lot of people - especially liberals in the media - who are in a big hurry to explain everything bad that happens as a result of "white racism". And that's not how I see things.

I think there are people who dislike other people because of their race, sex, religion, nationality, or whatever group they belong to. I think this is wrong and I try to judge people based on their actions and their character.

I think that there are people who choose to do bad things, and these people may be of any race, sex, religion, or nationality.

I think there are places in the world where people don't like outsiders, and if you walk through those places and you don't look like you belong you could get hurt bad. I think this is wrong too, but I can't change it. And I do not believe that these places are found only in America.

Lee Smith to Syrian Oppo: Why Americans Aren't In A Hurry to Help You

Lee Smith at Now:

It’s true that, on the other hand, there is some bipartisan backing for your cause, but the reality is that arming your sons, husbands, and brothers is not popular with the American public, neither with the right, nor the left. Americans are tired of the Middle East, frustrated by it – also, frankly, we’re angry.

Over the last decade, the United States has brought down or helped to bring down four Arab dictators, and with little to show for it. For spending trillions of dollars to topple Saddam, you’d think that instead of conspiracy theories imputing the worst motives to us, we might have earned some gratitude in the region. Gratitude at least for the sacrifices made by our family and friends in uniform, the thousands dead, the tens of thousands wounded, so that Iraqis can vote in free and fair elections and live without fear of being dragged off by Saddam’s security forces to be tortured, raped, and murdered.

We also helped bring down Qaddafi, which didn’t stop Libyan Islamists from killing our ambassador there and three other Americans. ...

Read the rest at the link.

The World Today

Before Google Reader vanishes from cyberspace, here are a few recent items from the feeds:

Massive protests in Egypt against Morsi. 'Huge protests calling for the resignation of Egypt's President Mohammed Morsi and early presidential elections are taking place in the capital, Cairo, and other cities' on the anniversary of Morsi's rise to power. 'The protesters' goal again is to unseat a president, this time their first freely elected leader, the Islamist ....' PowerLine sees a religious/secular struggle. More at Arutz Sheva.

The US Park Police are missing a lot of guns. Maybe the Canadian Mounties can find 'em?

Life in post-tinfoil-hat reality.

Caroline Glick on Obama's foreign policy. Jonathan Spyer on Qatar.

Chicago Tribune calls for special prosecutor in the IRS scandal. And here in San Francisco, BART looks ready to go on strike.

Priorities

Boston Police Exercise Featuring Right-Wing Terrorists With Backpack Bombs Disrupted By Real Muslim Terrorists With Backpack Bombs:

The scenario had been carefully planned: A terrorist group prepared to hurt vast numbers of people around Boston would leave backpacks filled with explosives at Faneuil Hall, the Seaport District, and in other towns, spreading waves of panic and fear. Detectives would have to catch the culprits.

Months of painstaking planning had gone into the exercise, dubbed “Operation Urban Shield,” meant to train dozens of detectives in the Greater Boston area to work together to thwart a terrorist threat. The hypothetical terrorist group was even given a name: Free America Citizens, a home-grown cadre of militiamen whose logo would be a metal skull wearing an Uncle Sam hat and a furious expression, according to a copy of the plans obtained by the Boston Globe. ...

Flashback: "Police Go Undercover to Thwart Protesters Against Globalization"

Cheerios

I'm sharing this just because it's Friday.
Oh wait, it's Thursday? Then I'm sharing it just because.

習近平去死

Harry's Place on Edward Snowden's Hong Kong hypocrisy:

... [Snowden] said that he chose Hong Kong because the city has “a spirited commitment to free speech and the right of political dissent”.

Really? Really? When Hong Kong is overseen by China??

Global Voices reported just over seven weeks ago:

Hong Kong netizens are outraged by the abuse of police force in the arrest of a 46-year-old man for writing “Go to Hell, Xi Jinping” (習近平去死) on the stairwell of a residential building in Hong Kong’s Ma On Shan district. Xi Jinping is the President of China. ...

We, the People

There was a time in America when "the People" were a force to be reckoned with.

Now, the connotation is rather different:
http://video.foxnews.com/v/2448255679001/people-staff-forgets-obamas-speech/#

"People!" Spoken twice, in a peremptory tone. Now the term refers to staffers, underlings, vassals. Those who must literally trip over themselves to do the bidding of The One.

Secular Jew Ira Glass: Christians Portrayed as Crazies by Media

Beautiful. Link here.

How to tell when a Republican strategy is successful.

1. The Democrat media fret that it "could backfire". (Just trying to help!)
2. The Democrat media scold that it's not nice. (New civility, folks.)
3. The Democrat media dig up "at least one Republican" to condemn the tactic. (And usually at most one. Or one and a half if you count John McCain.)

At least one Republican doesn't like Rick Perry's "job raids".